


Something you just can't explain

by mybigfatcat



Category: Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN (Band)
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-20 20:44:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/589461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mybigfatcat/pseuds/mybigfatcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jin only left two things behind him, a turtle shaped magnet on Kame’s refrigerator door and a message in English Kazuya doesn’t understand, before he left for his American dream.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Something you just can't explain

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted/written 2011-11-06 at LJ ([ **HERE**](http://nimlothemeli.livejournal.com/7414.html)).

It was dark again, it was always dark when he got home, always darker than the night before and the night before that. It was like he was spiralling even further away from reality as he knew it, maybe he’d end up on an uncharted shore line somewhere totally new, just maybe... But he wouldn’t bet on that, he knew that he was just going to stay here, immersed in the ever growing darkness that blinded him just like if he was staring into the sun.

The stainless steal refrigerator door shone from the street lights outside the kitchen window, making him notice the piece of paper that hung there, fasted with a magnet in the shape of a turtle. A sick joke, had been his first thought when the other one had bought it for him, but with so much else which concerned that man he had never really found out the reason behind him putting it there.

He was sure that it was from him, because it had appeared just a day before he had left that first time, accompanied by a message that still hang were he had left it. It was in English, probably with poor grammar as well, and said something about always remembering something.

Kazuya snickered when he touched the paper and traced the contours of the small turtle, tracing the contours of himself.

“So this is where my story begins, huh?” he asked the small image of himself, disregarding from the blurry image of his real self in the stainless steel refrigerator door, “on my own now right?”.

The silence made him miss his family, his dog and even the staff at the office. If he stood there a few minutes more he was sure that he’d finally even miss the rest of the members in KAT-TUN, even though he had been aching to tell Koki to shut up just hours earlier. The darkness and the silence made him miss everything about the daytime, even the traffic jams and hours of waiting outside TV-studios.

The turtle started to warm under his touch, a sign that he had been standing there far to long lost in his own thoughts, a sign that the tub was probably filled.

 

“So you’re enjoying you’re day off right?” Koki asked with one of his insanely thin eyebrows raised. Kazuya himself had always sported very highly controlled eye brows, but Koki had recently taken it to a whole new level. Maybe he should ask why, but it didn’t seem like the right opportunity for that sort of thing.

“Then you can tell me why the hell you’re at the office buried in papers!?” Koki hissed trying to control his obvious rage. Maybe it was the right time to ask about the eyebrows...

“I can’t relax if I know there’s something left for me to do, you know that”, Kazuya answered trying to keep calm and relaxed. There were juniors loitering all over the place and he had worked hard on having a great relationship with them, he wouldn’t let a silly argument with this gangster destroy it.

“I’m calling Ueda, maybe he can punch some sense into you...” Koki huffed while fishing out his cell phone from his over sized chinos.

“Koki-”

“Hi! Ueda, are you still in the building or what?”

“Koki, please don-”

“Then you can get that firm ass of yours down to the third floor, the turtle has escaped”, Koki said and hung up. Some of the juniors close by seemed to be impressed by the victorious look he gave Kazuya, some looked like they would rather have their moms to cling to.

“That was fucking unnecessary!” Kazuya hissed in a low voice so that, hopefully, only Koki could hear.

“It was not! Me and Ueda are going to finish whatever it is you think is so important and YOU are going to go home again... or go to the park... or a book store... whatever you like. But you are not staying in this building and you are not going to go pick up some new script!”.

 

“Mhmm... and then they kicked you out?” Maru asked with a big smile.

“Yeah, they even asked the security to inform them if I set my foot in there again today”, Kazuya sulked while poking his pasta with his fork.

“There’s just one thing I can’t understand-”, Maru started but was cut short by an guy wearing a washed out hoodie stopping by their table giving Kazuya a strange look.

“Excuse me sir, can I help you?” Maru asked while kicking Kazuya under the table, making him aware of the intruder.

“No no... excuse me..” the man blurted out and walked away.

“What the hell was that about?!” Maru growled while throwing a piece of bread at his plate, “can you believe people these days, if they want our autographs then just ask! Don’t fucking disturb me and then walk away!” he continued.

Kazuya found it almost hilarious that Maru felt so strongly about it, he himself had stopped caring about personal boundaries and privacy a long time ago because he had no personal life left to protect.

“He got scared because he caught a sight of your nose in profile” he muttered into his whine glass which made Maru hiss and throw the rest of the massacred bread roll on him. Kazuya loved being tipsy in the middle of the day with Maru. What he didn’t love was that the man had made him think of Jin, it made his heart ache for something he didn’t know what it was.

 

Home again, dark, a bit chilly, lonely and dead quiet.

He started filling the tub up, like he always did, walking to the fridge, like he always did, touched the turtle on the fridge door, like he always did, removed the turtle magnet and the paper with it - like he had never done before.

“We don’t want anyone to catch a sight of you right? You’re my little secret, my own special friend” he whispered, afraid of that if he made too much noise the silence would retaliate.

 

“This is nice, we haven’t been together all at once in your place for ages” Koki sighed while making himself comfortable in Kazuya’s couch, a couch that had cost him so much that if Koki knew he’d jump straight up and give Kazuya a horrified look.

“I second that!” Junno called while trying to knock Ueda out in the fighting game they were playing on the big flat Tv-screen. Ueda mumbled something as well before he managed to kill Junno’s character in the game.

“Hey! That’s not how it’s supposed to work! You’re good at that in real life, I’M supposed to be good at it in the game!” Junno shouted while sporting those infamous crazy eyes he got while playing games.

“Shut up will ya!” Ueda retorted while pointing his fist at the shouting boy, a threat scary enough to even get Junno to stay quiet.

Kazuya peeked at his bandmates from the kitchen doorway, he couldn’t help but to love the shouting and the laughter echoing through his home. He wanted to tell them to let Junno freak out as much as he wanted, he never wanted it to get quiet again. Maru gave him a curious look from were he was standing bent over the dish washer loading in the plates and cutlery they’d used for dinner.

“You like it don’t you?”

“Mhm...” Kazuya answered with a smile before he could stop himself, he wasn’t even sure if he wanted to stop himself from admitting it.

“Then I’ll try to ignore that Taguchi is worse than ever...” Maru whispered to himself, barely loud enough for Kazuya to hear. It warmed his heart to the core.

 

There was more work to be done then there were hours of the day, the finale of the drama Kazuya starred in was getting closer and closer, there was no time at all for sleep. The few times he actually had time to make it back to the apartment he was to tired to even notice that it was dark and he had absolutely no time for talking with the small image of himself on the refrigerator door.

He had put it back there the minute after the boys left his apartment, but had locked the note in with baby pictures and other important mementos in the little fire proof safe he had bought placed under his bed. It wasn’t really necessary because he had memorized every letter of the note, even though he didn’t quite understand it all.

 

“You think he’ll come see us this time?” Junno asked with a big grin. Koki just kicked at him under the table and made a hissing noise perfected during the years he had tried to convince people he really was a gangster.

It took Kazuya a few seconds before he realized that they were talking about something he didn’t know about.

“Who? Who’s gonna see us?” he asked.

“No one Kame, it’s just Junno being a weirdo... you know him, alwa-”

“WHO!?” he snapped at Koki while standing up in front of him.

“Kame, calm down. We just thought that it’d be better... considering how you took it... we didn’t know what to-” Maru started but was himself cut off by Ueda.

“It’s Akanishi, he’s in Japan, the press caught him at the airport last week and I overheard some juniors that had heard Yamapi talk about it. There, I’ve said it, I don’t get why you guys keep whispering about him...”

But Kazuya didn’t hear the rest, he had already stormed out of the room and headed for his apartment.

 

“And, apparently, he didn’t come to see us...” Junno sulked while sitting in a corner watching Koki stretch.

“What did you expect?” Ueda asked, “him coming here, watching us while we practised? Going out for ramen and beer afterwards? Sharing stories about our crazy fans and our amazing live shows?”

Junno looked a bit hurt by his harsh words, like he was Akanishi hearing what was said, but it didn’t take him long to recover.

“No! I just thought that... that... that our friendship meant more to him... None of us have his number anymore... he’d have to look US up if he...” he said, letting the last words trail out into oblivion when he saw Kazuya in the mirrors on the wall. The sad look was replaced by a panicky one, the one were his always narrow eyes actually opened fully.

Kazuya felt his heart break all over again.

 

“It’s starting to become a ritual now right? Me coming home, standing here talking to you... maybe we should make this Kame-time” he said softly, giggling a bit at his own childish joke.

 

“You never really told me what happened when Jin left the first time”

Maru had booked a table at a criminally expensive restaurant in Shibuya and who was Kazuya to turn down a free meal? He just hoped that this wasn’t going to turn into an interrogation and that Maru would get hammered enough so he could get him to pay for him too.

“Nothing happened, it just collapsed in on itself, like a faltering building during an earthquake”

“You know I find that pretty hard to believe because you two were standing stronger an stronger by the day and you still are. If not that, then what happened?”

“I don’t remember Maru, I simply just can’t remember no matter how hard I try...”

“Thanks for the truth” Maru said and gave him a reassuring smile.

What he didn’t tell Maru was that he was certain of the fact that if he had remembered then he probably could’ve stopped Jin from leaving a second time.

 

Their dressing room was quiet, just like it always was when they all were to fed up with it all, when they couldn’t stand the sight of anything JE or themselves. Kazuya himself felt like he was having trouble breathing, like the room was closing in on him.

“He can’t be serious...” Junno sniffed from his left, he seemed to be the only one that actually felt sad.

“He must’ve been because he said it after thinking about it... and we all know that if Akanishi has thought about something then he’s pretty sure about it” Ueda said from his right, making the whole room freeze up.

“I never want to see him again!” Junno burst out, tears flowing down his flushed cheeks, making Kazuya want to hug him but then he was already out of the room and Kazuya was still sitting on the floor.

Koki awoke from his deep thoughts and threw a empty water bottle on the floor, starting to mimic Jin’s words in a nasal tone, “it was child play, never serious enough, always too flashy and too flamboyant for anyone but screaming girls and housewives to buy in to. If someone would ask me to do those things again I’d be embarrassed and ask them if something was wrong with them-”

“Koki, please, don’t-” Maru said but Koki didn’t stop.

“When you’re in the middle of it you get blind, it’s like the Stockholm syndrome or something...” Koki finished and emphasized his anger by kicking the water bottle he seconds earlier had thrown on the floor.

“I think he’s right though...” Kame whispered almost to himself, but the others heard and Koki made sure to slam the door extra hard when he stormed out.

 

“I called and told him I hated him” Pi exclaimed while sitting down at the table next to Kazuya.

“Who?”

“What do you mean who? Jin off course!”

“Oh... you shouldn’t have done that, you’ll regret it later”

“The hell I will!”

“He’s one of your best friends Pi, you WILL miss him and you WILL regret it”

“Maybe... but he’s not smart enough to hold it against me forever and I’m not stupid enough to let things like this be left unnoticed”

“If you say so...”

“Yes Shuji-kun, I say so, and Akira is always dead on when it comes to friendships”

 

“Koki refuses to speak with me”

“It’ll pass Kame, he’ll get over it. You know that he’s the gangster with a golden heart” Maru said comfortingly. And sure enough, Kazuya found Koki outside his door a week later with a bottle of expensive rice wine. It was less dark in the apartment after that night.

 

**A year later**

“You said you’d never want anything to do with him again” Kazuya stated while looking at Junno’s music collection, “you’ve got all his singles and his album here”.

Junno smiled shyly and seemed to gather his courage before he spoke. “Yeah... I couldn’t help myself. Even if he doesn’t think I’m worth while anymore, I still feel responsible for him as a band mate. Does that sound corny?”

“No, Taguchi, that sounds just right”

 

His home still felt lonely and empty, but the darkness had left his kitchen now, the brave little turtle refrigerator magnet fighting it off every night for his sake. There was a new piece of paper hanging from him, a cute drawing of a dog his nephew had made him, small scribbles of spidery looking kanji that stated that it was for “Kamenashi”. Maybe it was the painting that gave the turtle energy enough to keep fighting.

The bath was heavenly hot and the whole bathroom smelled of lavender and soap, making the air look almost purple. Kazuya had just sunk down in his own little paradise when the door bell rang and he was forced out of his zen state. he wondered who it would be, calling in at his home one o’clock in the morning. He hoped it wasn’t about his family.

What he hadn’t expected was that he’d be standing in his doorway wearing only a half open bathrobe while Jin stood on the other side, staring at the floor, looking like a lost animal.

“Y-you!” Kame stuttered.

“Hi Kamenashi”

“Why are you here?”

“I need a place to crash”

 

“So he just turned up at your apartment asking if he could sleep there?!” Koki asked while clenching his fists. He slowly stood up and started to walk towards the door but was cut off by Ueda wearing an incredibly focused look.

“Where are you going?” Ueda asked Koki.

“Now that I know were that fucker is hiding I’m going to punch him and then I’m gonna make him eat his own words while I kill him!”

“No, you’re not, you’re going to stay right here and we are going to finish our practice for the television show. Back OFF!” Ueda ordered while pointing with his whole hand. Even though he hadn’t been KAT-TUN’s leader for a decade he was definitely the best one on calming everybody down.

“I don’t mind him being there Koki” Kame said while smiling reassuringly.

Ueda clapped his hands and gestured for them all to gather around, “There you go, Kame-chan is okay, Akanishi is finally talking to someone, Junno will get over his stupid heart break and we will all have a good practice. Now lets go!”

 

He sneaked a look at him once in a while when he was sitting in Kazuya’s sofa, probably getting extremely persistent stains on it. The pasta was boiling, the sauce was ready and he had a salad all prepared and mixed. His hands had shook like crazy when he chopped the vegetables, almost to the point where he would’ve had to ask Jin to help him finish it.

The butterflies in his stomach was something completely new to him, the last years of them working together had been filled with guilt, anger, irritation, exhaustion and regret, but he hadn't had butterflies in his stomach on Jin’s account for a long time. It made him feel like a little boy going to school for the first time.

 

“You wanna eat by the TV?” he asked making sure his voice was loud enough so Jin could hear it over the television.

“What?” Jin asked.

“I said-”

“No, I mean, you cooked for me?” Jin interrupted him, now standing in his kitchen.

“I, yes you’re the guest and... how could you miss that I was cooking? I came home with my arms full with groceries!” Kazuya said while pointing irritatedly at the food.

Jin gave him an apologetic look and raised his hands as if Kazuya were pointing a gun at him, a reaction he had used more and more as they grew older and grew further apart.

“I just wish that you would’ve asked me first because I’m leaving in like half an hour...”

“Oh”

 

When Kazuya came out of his room the next morning he noticed a new piece of paper hanging from his turtle on the fridge. He could only make out the words “thank you” and “bye” this time.

 

“GONE?!” Junno shrieked.

“Yeah, I kinda got a bit... emotional... when he said that he was leaving again, after just one night, so I locked myself into my bedroom. I don’t know where he left to”

“He actually spoke to one of us this time at least” Ueda stated while looking through a teenage girl magazine someone had left it in their dressing room. Ueda seemed fascinated by it and never let his eyes leave the pages.

“A break through” Maru added.

“If someone decodes the behaviour of that idiot then that person deserves a Nobel Price. I don’t care in what category, that person would’ve earned it.” Koki muttered, just as angry as he had been the day before but his disappointment seemed to win over his temper this time.

Junno looked hurt on Jin’s behalf and sobbed with dry eyes, “don’t be mean!”

 

**Two years later**

It was spring and the sun seemed to shine brighter than ever before, but his bedroom was still the darkest room in the house in spite of the fact that it was the room with the biggest windows. Kazuya slept in his guest room once or twice a month, just to be able to cope with the utter darkness ruling his bedroom, so he could dream. The nights he spent in his own bed were black, dreamless and cold, just like his life had been for quite a while.

The daily routines were wearing him down in a way they had never done when he was younger, sometimes he wondered if it was the fact that he was carrying the “A” as well as his “K”, but he couldn’t be sure of anything anymore.

Sometimes he just wished that something would break his melancholic state, sometimes he wished that he could stay that way forever. He was twenty eight years old now, far too old to live his live frivolously and careless, far too old to start over again. There were so many things he wished that he had done, asked Jin why he found him outside his door in the middle of the night, why he stayed at his place, why he left the day after without even telling him why...

Why- Why was his door bell ringing?

 

He knew it was Jin even before he opened the door, he knew it from the way the bell was pressed, it was all desperation and shyness.

“Again?” he asked.

“Hi Kamenashi... again”

“Come in-”

“Oh, I’m not here for that... I just thought that I’d stop by and say hello because I was near by and-”

“Shut up and get your skinny ass inside!” Kazuya growled.

 

“How come your apartment looks exactly the same as two years ago?” Jin asked while he sat in the sofa. Kazuya looked at his apartment and realized that Jin was actually right. He had the same colored curtains up, he had replaced his old plants with new ones of the same sort and the furniture were on the same spots as then. The thing was that it hadn’t looked like that for only two years, it had looked like that for at least six.

“So you’re criticising my taste in interior design as well these days? I thought that you only restricted yourself to commenting on our livelihoods”

“Ah... that”

“Yes, that! You have the right to feel whatever you feel but you didn’t have to blurt it all out on TV! It’s all over the world now, how disgustingly complaisant we are, how we sell our bodies to that old man”

“I wasn’t my idea in the first place” Jin sulked while clutching one of Kazuya’s faux fur pillows.

“I don’t fucking care Akanishi, I can’t care about what you say while keeping my mental health stable... you’re too unpredictable”

The room fell silent and for the first time in Kazuya’s life it seemed that he wouldn’t have to fight any harder for the point to be made, Jin sat there, still clutching the pillow, looking regretful and ashamed. But then again, he was the unpredictable man.

“Fight back then, tell the world how much of an ass I’ve been, how I held you back all these years and how you all felt that you’d gotten much farther if you wouldn’t have to drag me with you!”

“That would be lying, Akanishi, and I try to refrain from lies, no matter how much YOU think them to be true”

Kazuya stormed off and locked himself in to his bedroom, just like the last time Jin had made an unexpected call.

 

“HE’S BACK?!!” Junno cried out.

“Oh god... not today, not today...” Ueda chanted in the corner. Kazuya gave Koki a puzzled look while pointing at the moaning residue of their band mate.

“He got knocked out yesterday in a match, it was awsome!” Koki announced while punching the air, apparently mimicking Ueda’s adversary.

“You went to see him fight?”

“Yeah, I thought I oughta’ find out if all that practice is good for something. So what's this about Akanishi?”

“He came to my place late last night, claimed he just wanted so say hello while he was in the neighbourhood, I thought it was suspicious so I invited him in. It all went a bit sour when I confronted him about that interview though...”

“I bet it did. Hey, can’t you bring him here for lunch tomorrow, it’d be nice seeing his girly face again, I promise to restrain the haters and that weirdo Taguchi”

“I don’t know, we’ll see”

 

“It doesn’t matter what I said in that interview anyway, I’m still dead - my career is still over”

Yes, there was that small detail that most of them had decided to repress. Maybe not anymore considering that Koki wanted them all to have lunch together, but they would probably never talk about it. Ended careers and expulsion from JE was something no one dared to talk about - it was like they thought it could be contageus.

Jin was sitting in the dark huddled up in the sofa with a big hoodie covering most parts of his scrawny body. He looked fragile, not puppy-fragile like he had been when they were kids though, he looked more like a hurt doe.

“So it was a last resort?”

“Yeah, but here I am, still not American enough and still a fucking car wreck...”

“Does Johnny know you’re here?”

“I don’t know why he would care, it’s not like I’m “the” Jin Akanishi anymore, gotta find a honest job now”

Yes, and there was that too... the honest job-thing. Something they all had talked about over and over again when they were waiting for their debut, what would they do with their lives if they were forgotten?

“Do you want to eat lunch with us tomorrow? Koki would like that”

“I don’t know, Kame” Jin said. It made Kazuya blush, the way he used his nickname again after so many years of indifference and rivalry, he didn’t have to lock himself into his room that night.

 

Kazuya could tell by the high pitched squeals Junno were producing that Jin already sat in the restaurant when they got there. Maru were all smiles and even Ueda had a special glint in his eyes, even though he’d rather die then to smile open heartedly at Jin.

“I think we need to feed this skeleton” Koki announced after they were seated by the table, which made the lunch end up like a “who can get Akanishi to eat the most”-competition. Ueda won, mostly because he kept showing Jin his fist across the table.

 

“Let’s not do that again for a while” Jin sighed out as he once again huddled up in Kazuya’s couch. The living room was all bright now, even though he had only lit the lights in the hallway as the had come in. It wasn’t lonely either because even though Jin was a shadow of his old self he was still a living creature.

“It was fun” he answered him while walking into his kitchen, giving Jin a last glance before he stood in front of the fridge and quietly greeted his friend the turtle.

“Why are you touching the fridge magnet?”

Jin’s voice made him jump, taking a quick step back from the fridge, staring at the little turtle centered in the blurry reflection of himself.

“Uhm...”

Jin walked up to the fridge and touched the little creature with his long and thin fingers, smiling faintly. “Well if it isn’t the turtle I left here”

“I figured you left it here for a reason... but I still can’t get my head around how you got into my apartment”

“It was easy enough once I’d charmed your mother to open the door for me”

“My mom?”

“I knew she came here at Wednesdays while you were at work to clean the place up for you, so I waited until she got here. It was tricky to convince her though, she seemed to think that I was going to poison your toothpaste or something”

“That would make more sense then you leaving a secret message”

“I guess it would”

 

It was still painfully dark in his bedroom. The streetlights outside didn’t even manage to cast shadows in the room, they just faintly lit the glass panes of the windows. A night like this, a night were he could not wind down and could not relax his tense muscles, he usually went to his guest room and spent the night there - but he could obviously not do that this time. So instead he started filling the tub, hoping that the warm water would get him sleepy.

The warm water didn’t really make his brain slow down though, it made his thoughts go straight to Jin’s smiling face while Koki refused to laugh at one of Junno’s jokes which made everybody else laugh. It made him think about the day they debuted, the adrenaline rushing through his veins and joy clouding his eyes, watching Jin beside him. It made him think of warm hands, late night laughs, puffs of hot breath against his face, the thrill of getting to go on stage with Jin, sing with Jin, record with Jin, eat with Jin, play with Jin... and then he had left for Los Angeles...

The warm water didn’t relax him at all.

“Oh, I didn’t know you were up-” Jin yawned out standing in the doorway with tangled bed hair wearing that enormous hoodie that might’ve looked okay on him when he weighed 20 pounds more.

“I couldn’t sleep” Kazuya answered, quickly collecting all the foam he could find to cover up his naked body in the water.

Jin gave him a strange look, almost questioning, but it disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

“Do you... need anything?” Kazuya asked after a few intensely quiet seconds.

“No, no. But you look kinda awful you know”

“I can’t sleep anymore, I think I’ve gotten afraid of the dark” Kazuya admitted shyly.

“It isn’t dark here, I’d say that your apartment is painfully light and bright. If you ever decide to change the style of it I recommend a bit more colors than white”

Kazuya sighed, off course Jin wouldn’t see the darkness, he never saw the things Kazuya saw because they had always been so different. Maybe he should just keep quiet, refrain from explaining it to him.

“Are you on about my taste in interior design again? If you feel so strongly about it then maybe you should make it a project of yours”

“Redecorate your apartment?!”

“Why not?”

Kazuya had surprised himself coming up with the idea, but now that it was out there it sounded like a fantastic idea. He would do anything to keep Jin from leaving again, he wanted to save them all from the heart break.

“By the way, have you spoken with Yamashita?” he asked to bring Jin back from what seemed to be close to a state of shock.

“Mhm, he mails me every day, he keeps nagging me about coming to his place but I...”

“Yes?”

“I’m staying here right?”

“You are”

 

His hallway was filled with boxes and trash bags making navigation without being buried under piles of stuff a difficult task. He could smell the fresh paint in the air and the covered furniture out on the curb gave him a pretty good idea of what was going on.

“Jin?”

“Yeah-” Jin answered with a muffled voice, coming somewhere from his livingroom.

When he entered he was amazed by the change that had been made just during one day. One of his white walls was painted in a deep blue shade, someone had put up a big book case in dark wood against another wall and the drapes had been substituted by new ones in black and blue linen. The whole room looked tranquil and serene, something he had lacked in his crisp and white modern designs, it looked like Jin.

“It looks amazing Jin!”

“Thanks, and thanks for calling me Jin” the paint covered man answered giving him a smile definitely not befitted for the thirty year old man he was. Kazuya loved that smile.

 

His apartment was starting a new life, room by room, day by day. The darkness had been vanquished from every room but his own bed room, a room Jin seemed to avoid going in to. When all the new furniture had arrived, the old ones had been sent away and the last curtain hung he had no other choice than to drag Jin there.

“You’ve got this room left before you get payed”

“I wasn’t sure if I should touch this room”

“Why?”

“It’s just a hundred percent you...”

“I want it gone”

“Huh?-”

“Get rid of it, the last bit of me. I don’t even think it is me anymore, just do it”

“Kazuya-”

“You’ve got my permission Jin”

“Okay, I’ll start tomorrow”

 

“And he’s been redecorating your apartment these past weeks?” Maru asked giving Kazuya the most disbelieving look he could manage. Ueda had retreated into another teenage girl magazine left in the dressing room. The sometimes manic eyes he got made Kazuya’s hair stand on ends.

“A great job at that”

“I can’t believe it...”

“You don’t have to, I’ll show you when it’s all done”

Maru nodded but didn’t seem to want to let the subject go just yet, so when Koki walked in through the door he brought the subject up again.

“Koki feels the same way Kame, you know how Jin is. We always joke about his antics, but he really is a strange guy, will you be okay when he goes AWAL on you again?”

“If he wants to leave then he should leave, I’m not his mom you know”

“No... you're something more fragile than that”

 

Maru’s words haunted him all the way home in his car. He couldn’t believe that they saw him like a little porcelain figure, ready to be crashed into the floor, breaking into million pieces. Of all the people he knew he had thought that at least his bandmates were the ones who actually understood him, but apparently he was wrong. It made him irritated and sad at the same time. Maybe he really was as alone as he always felt.

He got a shock when he entered his apartment and found that the hallway was cleared out, sporting grey walls and a new coat rack. No trace of boxes or plastic bags as far as the eye could see. It was quiet and still, but not quiet in that way he had gotten used to, he could actually faintly hear the traffic on the streets outside the building.

“Jin? Are you here?”

“I’m in the back”

Jin’s voice felt just right, like it belonged in his home, it made him feel warm and fuzzy. The turtle magnet on the fridge blinked at him and gave him a wry smile as he walked past the kitchen, Kazuya blinked back.

His bedroom was still mostly white but his bed sheets were deep red and his curtains were in a similar color. The closets which had been all white had gotten mirror doors and the bed frame was big, rustic and dark. It wasn’t a particularly manly bedroom, but it felt like he belonged there by his new antique desk or amongst those flowing sheets.

“I think you’ve really earned a paycheck now” Kazuya told Jin who stood beside him close to the doorway.

“I think so too”

“It’s not quite the same as the rest of the apartment though, it’s a bit flashier”

“It’s because this was especially for you”

“Oh”

Jin put his hand on his shoulder and the sudden warmth made Kazuya flinch and take a quick breath of air.

Nothing that Kazuya did went unnoticed by Jin, it had always been that way, he had always been monitored even when they weren’t friends anymore. That Jin gave out a disappointed sigh though didn’t really fit the image.

The old Jin would’ve tsked at him or blown up in his face, the new Jin left and slammed the door to the guest room shut. The new Jin was gone an hour later, not even leaving a message with his little turtle friend. Kazuya didn’t notice that his bedroom had been released from the darkness that had haunted him because he slept in Jin’s bed that night, taking in every part of Jin’s scent before it faded away.

 

“You know, I’m starting to suspect that you’re not that into girls Shuji-kun” Yamapi said while giggling at something he read on his cell phone, “you didn’t even look twice when that model dropped her skirt during photoshoot”

“So what?”

“You’re confessing?!”

“What if I am?”

“Oh, nothing much... I just always thought that you were so cool about it because you were a gentleman. I had no idea that you were... G-A-Y”

Kazuya laughed at Yamapi’s jokingly terrified face, he always knew that Yamapi was the one that would take it the best in all of JE.

“This makes me a bit worried though”

“Worried?” Kazuya asked.

“Mhm, because this kinda means that Jin has been suffering all in wain”

“WHAT did you say?!” Kazuya spit out while straightening up in his chair.

“Well, I haven’t heard it from himself, but isn’t it kinda obvious that he’s longing and pining for you? Everybody talks about it...”

“Apparently they haven’t talked about it with ME”

Yamapi gave him an sneeky look and shifted closer to him, “but now when Jin isn’t JE anymore, you’re free to do what ever you want you know. Johnny can’t suspend you for having a relationship with a mere civilian”

“Shut up Akira!”

 

It felt wrong to bring anyone to his apartment, it was risky to let anyone know were he lived and he didn’t like the thought of having sex in the home Jin had created for him. So he followed the guy he met at the club to his home. Kazuya was all needy kisses, searching touches and shallow breaths while the taller man worked on his belt and the buttons in his jeans, occasionally brushing against his hard cock. He was just the right height, just so Kazuya had perfect access to his neck and ears, so that he had to tilt his head upwards when the other man kissed him.

He’ s just the same size as Jin, Kazuya caught himself thinking and that made his stomach drop.

“I’m sorry, I can’t do this...”

“Eh...It’s okay”

“I really didn’t mean to lead you on like this, I just...”

“Right. I’ll call you a cab, yes?

“Yes”

And then Kazuya went home to the empty apartment now no longer filled with darkness, but with regret.

 

A few weeks passed by, nothing changed except the fact that Kazuya didn’t even try to give plausible explanations to why his heart was broken by Jin leaving again. Ueda kept giving him disapproving looks while he read those teenage girl magazines which always seemed to be present in their dressing rooms these days, but he seemed to be more disturbed by the fact that Junno had started reading them as well.

Photoshoot followed interview, interview followed tv-show shooting, it all went a bit blurry for Kazuya and several times he found himself wondering what show he was on, because he couldn’t remember the title of it. This was something he hadn’t have to deal with since they were just debuted, he ought to be more professional now, but he simply couldn’t concentrate while his thoughts kept wandering back to Jin.

His wake up call came when Junno had to kick him under the table when they were on national TV, the host looked at him like he was something incredibly weird and not even his most shining smile could win him back on his side. It was the TV-appearance of hell... he never wanted to be in that situation again.

That’s why he found himself outside Yamapi’s apartment after they were finished. He was so nervous he thought he would keel over by the time Yamapi opened his door and when he had gotten Jin’s phone number he walked back to his car on wobbly legs, sitting there for twenty minutes trying to calm his heart down. This was the craziest thing he had ever done.

 

“Hi” Jin said on the other end of the line, sounding happy and relaxed.

“Hi Jin... it’s me”

“Kazuya? Wow... I’d never thought you’d call me”

“I-I just wanted to know if you were alright... and I owe you some money too you know”

Jin went silent for a moment and Kazuya was just going to laugh a bit nervously when he heard a woman somewhere behind Jin, asking him if he wasn’t going to join her soon. Kazuya blushed and panicked.

“Oh, I-it wasn’t anything important really, I won’t be keeping you any longer-sorry for bothering you-”

“Kame, stop mumbling, I can’t hear a word you’re saying! Wait, I’ll come to your place, don’t go anywhere!”

“But I’m not at home” Kazuya answered but Jin had already hung up on him.

 

“I was starting to think that you were hiding from me”

“I’m really sorry, I wasn’t at home when you said that you were coming and you hung up and-” Kazuya panted while he half-ran down the corridor to his apartment door. Jin stood up from the floor and brushed the backside of his jeans off, a pair of jeans that to Kazuya’s surprise weren’t baggy and worn out.

“It’s okay, I figured as much, I’m not really dumb you know - just slow - and I had a lot of time on my hands for figuring it out”

 

Jin sat down on his couch, his new “not so expensive as the last one but still as fashionable” brown couch, picked out for him by Jin.

“Come on, let’s talk. You haven’t called me for like four years, so now it’s gotta be important right?” Jin asked while pointing at the vacant seat beside him, urging Kazuya to sit down.

“I felt like shit when you left that day” Kazuya admitted, now sitting to the right of his ex bandmate and old friend.

“I even slept in your bed, I couldn’t sleep in my own...” Kazuya added shyly, he could feel the warmth emminating from Jin’s body just centimeters away.

“You did what?” Jin asked with big eyes. Kazuya couldn’t help but to feel nostalgic when Jin’s adult behaviour and controlled external crumbled away and left the young and innocent idiot to be seen.

“There’s one thing I’ve always wondered though, something I think you owe me an answer to; why did you leave?”

“You mean that day?”

“No, why did you leave the first time, when we had debuted?”

“You still haven’t figured it out? I thought you did after Pi called and told me you had come out as gay to him-” Jin started but stopped as he saw the confusion in Kazuya’s face.

“Silly, I left because I fell in love with you” he explained, looking at Kazuya like he had used to do so many years ago, almost an eternity ago. That look that had always made Kazuya’s heart race, made his breath hitch in his throat and hands go hot with expectation, that look that had always made Kazuya feel loved. He dared to shift closer and tried to stop himself from climbing onto Jin’s lap, although he suspected that this was the first time in years that he could go close to Jin without earning an disapproving hiss from someone. It felt so right being close to him, here in the room he had created for Kazuya, the room he had driven the darkness and the silence out of.

“Has that always been the reason to why you leave?” Kazuya whispered, throat dry and eyes shut. Not daring enough to look at Jin’s expression while the answer came.

Jin didn’t answer though, instead he put his hands on Kazuya’s arms and pulled him onto the lap Kazuya seconds ago had tried to stop himself from climbing onto by his own free will. Kazuya’s skin heated up wherever Jin’s breath hit him, he could hardly believe what was happening and he could only sigh contently when Jin pressed soft kisses all over his neck and whispered “yes, it was” into his ear.

Suddenly it all made sense, everything said, everything done and he could finally let himself forgive Jin for leaving and himself from not understanding the reason why. But the time for thinking passed when Jin kissed him for the first time and sent shivers down Kazuya’s spine.

It wasn’t a perfect kiss but it was so longing and warm that Kazuya just melted into it and found his own hands wandering on Jin’s back, one finding his long soft hair and the other returning down to sneak under Jin’s ridiculous hoodie.

“I always hated these things” he whispered while Jin momentarily left his mouth to be able to kiss his neck again.

“They’re practical and they hid my excess weight” Jin sulked but Kazuya could feel that he smiled against his skin.

“Yes, but you’re more like underweight now”

“Then cook for me Kazu, always cook for me, only for me” Jin moaned when Kazuya found his way under the big mess of fabric and caressed his lean back.

Kazuya didn’t get a chance to answer because a second later Jin had pulled the hoodie off and was tugging at the end of his T-shirt, pouting like a puppy, like as if he were 17 again and wanted Kazuya to come with him to the arcade. Who was he to refuse? He gladly assisted him in removing it, throwing it somewhere on the floor next to the hoodie; which he intended to burn as soon as he got the chance to.

He looked so breathtakingly beautiful in the soft light from the streetlights. Skin paler than before but still perfect, soft and smooth. His dark eyes half-lidded, mouth plump and red. Jin was the most perfect man he had ever laid his eyes on and he had been just as perfect when he first met him decades ago.

Jin’s mouth was back on his, touching every part he could with his tongue, exploring and drawing out sounds from Kazuya he didn’t even know he could make. Their half naked bodies pressed against each other trying to feel as much of the other as they could. Kazuya could tell that Jin was hard and his own jeans felt uncomfortably tight and hot, so he started working on Jin’s belt while Jin’s hands roamed his lower back, getting closer and closer to the edge of his pants. He arched his back when he felt a hand slipping inside his pants, touching one of the cheeks, letting out a deep moan.

“Have you done this before Jin?” he asked while he got Jin’s zipper open and placed his hands on his hips in wait for an answer.

“Yes... Kazuya, just... please just fuck me. I love you so fucking much-”

Kazuya backed off only to grab Jin’s hands and drag the surprised looking man onto his feet, with slow steps he led him back to the bedroom Jin lovingly had created for him and started to undress him as Jin returned the favor.

It was almost to good to be true, to be lying naked on top of Jin, feeling his warm skin against his own, his hard member pressed against Jin’s thigh while he kissed and sucked his way down Jins chest and stomach. Jin’s needy sound reminded him of what he was going to do in the first place, before he got addicted to the taste of his skin, so he quickly jumped off the bed, grabbed the lube in his bed stand and got back to his awaiting lover.

It got even harder to concentrate when he inserted a lubed finger inside him, Jin’s body shaking with anticipation. The hotness of Jin’s inside and the calling of his own urges made him hurry his preparation, scissoring and adding a second finger, earning an almost amazing moan from Jin, telling him that he had found Jin’s pleasure spot.

“Kazuya-I-please”

Jin looked him in the eyes and he couldn’t hold himself back, he entered Jin slowly letting himself sink deeper and deeper until he was completely surrounded by Jin. He started moving when Jin arched his back and quickened his pace as he bent down over Jin, kissing him, letting him slip his tongue inside his mouth. When the man beneath him suddenly jerked and drew in a hissing breath he knew that he had managed to find the right angle.

“I love you” Jin almost sighed while Kazuya started to stroke his abandoned erection.

“I love you too”

It didn’t take long before he came and Jin followed suit seconds after, both of them panting, trying to see each other through the waves of pleasure. It was the most perfect moment in Kazuya’s life and the look Jin gave him told him that the other felt the same.

 

“Where did you go? I almost thought that you’d left me here and fled to Hawaii or something...” Jin pouted when Kazuya entered the bedroom a few hours later.

They had lain there, whispering secrets and talking about childhood memories until Jin had fallen asleep. Kazuya had his head on Jin’s bony arm and that reminded him of the fact that Jin was unnaturally skinny, so he had wormed his way out of bed, taken a quick shower and then begun his mission.

“I cooked for you” he answered with a smile watching Jin’s eyes light up with expectation.

The way Jin ate hadn’t changed, neither had the amount he was capable of eating and it didn’t take long before Kazuya had discarded the dishes on the floor and was back in the arms of his beloved Jin.

He couldn't completely relax though because something was gnawing at the back of his mind.

"That woman!" Kazuya exclaimed when he remembered the voice he had heard earlier when he had called Jin.

"What woman?" Jin asked sleapily.

"The woman you were with when I called you" Kazuya pouted.

"Kazu, I don't think you should be jealous of my mother" Jin said while slowly rolling on top of him, "I've been living at my parent's place while I try to figure out what to do with my life."

"Oh... I should've thought of that..." Kazuya muttered under his breath as a burning blush spread over his cheeks. Of course he had been too rash, next time he should stop and think instead.

"You know, you're incredibly cute when you're jelous - turtle cute" Jin whispered before he started kissing him all over his face.

 

“Oh, I really like what he did with the bookshelves!” Maru exclaimed. Junno had occupied the big leather arm chair in the corner and was already playing his latest Nintendo system with a content smile on his face.

“Where did he go to anyway?”

“I think he’s showing Ueda the guitar he bought at the music store yesterday, you should’ve seen his face when he got home, he looked like a little kid again”

“That really sounds cute” Koki said from his place in front of the window, “He got the job there then?”

“Mhm”

 

Kazuya could’ve stopped time just there, having his old friends here with him, knowing that the person he had always loved with his whole heart loved him back, knowing that the darkness could never return again. But then Jin hugged him from behind while pressing his soft lips against the nape of his neck and he changed his mind - he wanted to slowly grow old like this.

He was brought back from his daydreaming by Junno’s howl when Ueda tried to pull the game system out of his hands and he realized that maybe it would be enough to just meet the guys at work, keeping his home exclusively as his and Jin’s home - the safe haven Jin had made them. And by them he meant, he himself, Jin and his small turtle friend.


End file.
